Glimpses

by Lewis Shiner

Overview

Ray Shackleford is trying to deal with the death of his father and the collapse of his marriage when the impossible happens. Music that no one has ever heard before begins to play from his stereo speakers. It is only the first step on a journey that will take him to Los Angeles, London, Cozumel, and points far beyond, and bring him face to face with Jim Morrison, Brian Wilson, Jimi Hendrix-and his own mortality.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781596063518
Publisher:	Subterranean Press
Publication date:	08/06/2010
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	314
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Lewis Shiner is the award-winning author of five novels, most recently Say Goodbye, The Laurie Moss Story. He lives in Durham, North Carolina.

Editorial Reviews

With Slam (1990), Shiner began the move away from his roots in science fiction towards the mainstream, a trend that continues in his latest effort. Here he adds a sci-fi touch to what is essentially a story of middle-aged angst. As Texas stereo repairman Ray Shackleford approaches 40, his marriage is moribund, his dreams of playing rock-and-roll guitar are fading and his estranged father has died in a scuba-diving accident. The twist comes right up front: working in his shop, ruminating on his troubles and fantasizing about the never-completed Beatles album Get Back , Ray finds he can not only imagine the music in extraordinary detail but can also make it play from his speakers. Mystified, Ray records the results and sends the tape to an oldies record producer, beginning an odyssey during which Ray goes on to finish the Doors' Celebration of the Lizard and other albums, eventually having seemingly real encounters with dead rockers the likes of Brian Wilson and Jimi Hendrix. While his life takes this odd turn, Ray begins to work through some of his problems, maturing and coming to terms with his father's death. Shiner writes with intense feeling about the music Ray loves and the turmoil he endures. The novel sparkles with painfully perfect evocations of the yearning, anomie and need that wrack Ray, yielding a story of uncommon sensitivity, insight and redemptive power. First serial to Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine. (July)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Shiner ( Slam , LJ 8/1/90, among others) has written what may be the first rock n roll time-travel novel. Ray Chackleford is a self-employed electronics repairman whose marriage is foundering and whose father has recently died. These unresolved relationships are complicated when Ray travels to the Mexican site of his father's death and promptly falls in love with a woman even more unstable than he. In the midst of this emotional turmoil, Ray--a rock drummer during his youth in the late Sixties--begins to hear in his head and manages to transfer to tape legendary unfinished recordings by Jim Morrison, Brian Wilson, and Jimi Hendrix. This music is accompanied by ``journeys'' into the troubled lives of these rock musicians. Shiner's appealing main character and his gripping style overcome the less believable aspects of his story. With the current comeback of the Sixties, this novel should be widely popular.-- A.J. Wright, Univ . of Alabama, Birmingham

Library Journal